A damning comment from Shane Flanagan that he doesn’t have the players to make changes to his winless team should be the final nail in his Dragons coaching coffin.
That is the opinion of Paul Crawley, who believes Flanagan has had three years to mould the squad in his image and what he has come up with is not getting the job done.
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The Dragons lost their sixth game in a row against Manly last start and are now the only winless team in the NRL and anchored to the wooden spoon position on the ladder.
Their losing streak goes back further to 10 counting last season and yet Flanagan has made no changes to his team ahead of their crunch clash with Souths in Round 7, which could decide his future.
“I thought it was really telling at the press conference the other day when Shane Flanagan, who’s in his third year at the club, and they’d lost their sixth game of the season and ten losses in a row, and he was asked about bringing people up and he said, I don’t know if I’ve got anyone. Trust me, if we had someone there to put through, I’d bring them up,” Crawley said on NRL 360.
“I think that’s a telling statement. I don’t know how the club put off making a change now because he’s in his third year and if he doesn’t see improvement after three years, I don’t know how you go forward on that.
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“What does that say to the reserve grade players? Even if he thinks it, why say it?”
Crawley feels Flanagan looks like a coach out of answers and questioned his theory that Tom Trbojevic was the difference in the loss to Manly.
“He said during his press conference also that he thought they tried for him, but Turbo was the difference,” Crawley continued.
“I thought Jamal Fogarty was as much a difference in that game as Turbo. The way he finished the sets compared to the way the Dragons halves finished the sets, it put the Dragons to shame.”
However, The Daily Telegraph’s Dave Riccio questioned if there were some glaring omissions in reserve grade that deserve an opportunity.
“I hear you on all that and I get where you’re coming from, but what changes do you want them to make?” Riccio said.
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Crawley explained that the reason Flanagan has no options to change the side is that he pushed quality players out of the club through a lack of opportunities.
“I’ll tell you where it’s gone wrong, there’s not another halfback that’s ready in the club because they’ve all been pushed out,“ Crawley said.
“You go through Jayden Sullivan, Jonah Glover, Lachlan Ilias, you can keep rounding these blokes up that have been pushed out of the club.
“You’ve got a young bloke there now in Kade Reed, who I think has played five NSW Cup games.
“I know it’s a danger bringing a young guy up, but at this stage, they’ve got to do something. You can’t keep treading water and think it’s going to be fixed.”
However, Riccio warned against throwing Reed to the wolves against South Sydney.
“But why crucify the kid against South Sydney who granted I don’t think we knew David Fifita was going to be sidelined for six weeks, but to have that edge of South Sydney, which is their potent weapon, going after Kade Reed?” Riccio said.
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Braith Anasta agreed that Reed was not ready to come into a team playing so badly, but put Flanagan on notice for his roster management and development of his players.
“I don’t think it’s about Kade Reed,” Anasta said.
“I wouldn’t play Kade Reed because of the diabolical state the club’s in right now because I wouldn’t want my young guy, who’s got a bright future throwing him into that team right now and that environment.
“I think the point is, is that he’s got no one to pick, but he’s got no one else to blame but himself for that, so you can’t make those excuses when you are the one that’s created that problem.”
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Crawley is adamant Flanagan signed his own coaching death warrant by admitting he doesn’t have the players and the depth that every club needs to be successful.
“I think he signed his own warrant on that one in respect to his future at the club by confirming that there’s no one there that he’s confident that he can bring up into his team,” Crawley said.
“It’s not his first season there. It’s not his second season there.”
Gorden Tallis interjected: “It’s his job to have kids ready and have kids coming through.”
“Of course it is,” Crawley replied.
“You’ve got football managers and you’ve got recruitment staff and you’ve got all this, but you’ve also got a head coach who is called the head coach because it’s his job to bring this all together.”
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